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Like Monopoly? You'll like Weblo

Mathew Ingram, today at 2:07 PM EDT

As the founder of an online gaming property called IBetX.com and an auction site called
Unique Auction.com, entrepreneur Rocky Mirza knows a little about what people like to
do with their money online, and he is hoping that they will want to spend some of it
buying and selling virtual properties as part of his newest venture, an online "virtual
world" called Weblo. Mr. Mirza has managed to get some high-powered backing for this
latest project (which launches on September 26) : one of the investors who put up $2.6-
million in a recent round of financing is none other than Richard Rosenblatt, whose most
recent company -- a little thing called MySpace.com -- was bought by News Corp. for
almost $600-million (U.S.) last year.

Weblo has a long way to go before it is as massive as MySpace, of course, but Mr. Mirza
says he believes it has the same kind of appeal as a social-networking site, with one
added element: money. And not the kind of virtual money that players use in a virtual
world such as Second Life or World of Warcraft, but real dollars. In a recent interview,
Mr. Mirza said Weblo is a little like the game of Monopoly, but "without the board and
with real money." Players buy the right to "own" real-world properties such as the Taj
Mahal, and then make money by either renting out space to other players, or from
advertising that runs on their part of the site. They can also make money by selling their
properties to others (Weblo takes a cut of each transaction).

There's more to it than just that, however. Mr. Mirza says Weblo also has a kind of
"Internet within an Internet" that is part of Weblo, and players can bid on and own
domain names as well -- such as PR.com or money.com -- and choose where they are
redirected to in the real world. In that way, a company's Weblo property could direct
players to its real-world Web site. Although Weblo originally planned to sell players the
right to any domain name that existed in the real world, Mr. Mirza said that trademark
issues got in the way and so no one will be allowed to own the Weblo version of
Google.com or Microsoft.com. The company also planned to let people buy and sell
celebrities such as Paris Hilton, but now they are only allowed to own (and buy or sell)
the right to maintain a Weblo site devoted to that celebrity (which could also include
advertising and other e-commerce tools).

Sound a little confusing? There's more. Players will also be able to buy and sell cities
such as Toronto or New York, and even to run for "mayor" of those cities, which will
allow them to collect taxes from anyone whose property is part of that city (taxes that are
split with Weblo). And in order to buy or sell a city, you have to be a citizen of whatever
virtual country that city belongs to, which means buying citizenship from Weblo -- which
only costs a few dollars, unless you need it immediately (in order to sell London to
another player, for example) in which case you can pay more for emergency citizenship.
"It's a second chance at life," says Mr. Mirza, who is originally from Ottawa. "Everything
that exists in the real world exists in Weblo, so you could buy Toronto and become
mayor of Toronto. It's like Monopoly on steroids." Weblo, which Mr. Mirza says he has
been thinking about and working on for nine years, launches on Sept. 26 and a basic
membership -- which comes with a free celebrity of your choice -- is free. Paying players
get a larger share of the revenue their virtual properties generate.